The Girl on the Yacht (12 page)

In the early morning darkness, Cameron West was doing eighty on the 5 freeway halfway to her office when she spotted the brake lights a mile ahead. Her driving instincts kicked in, and before reaching the morning rush-hour traffic, she veered across three lanes to the offramp. She wound around the maze of city streets thinking that one of her toughest cases was still in front of her, but she couldn’t stop recalling Mitch Taylor’s soft, blue eyes.

She pulled the unmarked Prius into the station house parking structure and took up the first open spot. Cameron bounded out of her car, headed down the ramp, and turned away from the sheriff’s building. For the first time, one of her murder cases felt hopeless. Not that she hadn’t lost hope at some point in other cases, but this investigation seemed doomed from the beginning.
I’ve got to get my team together this morning and reexamine everything. But first, coffee.

Cameron stirred her latte while walking out of the Starbucks across from her office. She chugged down a third of the grande portion before entering the building. When she opened the front door to the lobby, she pulled her focus back to her work. The customary nods and greetings welcomed her, throughout her trek to her corner office upstairs.

On the third floor, Sergeant Little Horse sat at his desk. The hard working investigator had started on the force long before she had. Being the Department’s first Native American, he had ground it out working his way up to sergeant while Cameron’s father was still in homicide. Without a college degree, he was passed over in those earlier days by many lesser, invariably younger officers.
The department’s loss
. She felt lucky to have him on her team. His incredible detective instinct––always two moves ahead in his thinking and especially his grind-it-out leg work––often proved to make the difference in breaking a case. Like with the cameras at the marina, he had been on it. Those skills made Little Horse an excellent trainer of the new college graduate hot shots that felt they knew everything they needed to know the day they set foot in the office. She glanced at his face that was framed by his tied-back long black hair. He shoved a brown file across the desktop in her direction.

“Your boyfriend doesn’t check out.” He grinned.

“What?”

“We got the word about your little boat ride yesterday morning.”

She gritted her teeth. “He’s not my boyfriend.”

“I don’t want to hear about it.” He waved a hand at her. “Phone cameras––you and the Doc onboard the boat––there are a couple of pictures floating around taken by one of the guys at the marina. Hell, by now your father probably has ‘em at home.”

She let out a long, deep exhale. “What do you mean, he doesn’t check out?” She ignored his last statement. “He’s not a doctor?”

“He’s a plastic surgeon, okay,” he nodded, “but his ‘out of the country’
story’ doesn’t work.”

She opened the file. Attached to a copy of her interview report was a fax that read, “Not verified.” She looked up at him.

“I contacted the Cancun police department. I asked Lieutenant Manuel Sanchez to confirm the details of Mitch Taylor’s story about the medical conference, including the hotel details. I sent him your report. A couple of hours later, he sent the fax. I called him back to discuss possible reasons why he had no information on the doctor or the conference. He told me he even checked out the nearby towns of Cozumel and Isla Mujeres––no hotels had him registered, and no conferences were held there.”

“Do you think this Sanchez did a thorough check, or was he just trying to get rid of you because you were creating additional work for him?”

“I thought of that, too. So, I checked with all the airlines that arrived in Cancun from any part of the U.S. for that Saturday. If I could find out when he got there, I could start to build a scenario for his whereabouts.”

Cameron stared at her old-school detective. Had he developed new skills? Her skepticism must have been apparent on her face.

“Okay, I had ‘Purdy-boy’ do his computer thing on that last part.” He glanced over at the corner where Jason Purdy sat at a folding table that served as the official trainee desk. The newest addition to the team typed on his computer while he spoke into his earpiece.

“Let’s not call him that,” Cameron said.

“It’s his name. Besides, with his jelled hair and innocence, ‘Purdy-boy’ kind of fits him.” He laughed. “Actually, I think he likes it.” Little Horse shrugged.

She shook her head. “What do you guys call me behind my back?” she asked.

“What––a nickname––for you? We won’t go there.” He smiled.

“What is it?”

“Ask your dad the next time you see him––he came up with it. That’s all I’m sayin’.”

“That’s a discussion we’ll have later.” She brought the topic back. “What did the airlines have for us?”

“
Nada
. None of the airlines going to Cancun had a Mitch Taylor arriving or departing for the past five days. Purdy checked and double-checked the facts. We’re certain he wasn’t there.”

She looked over at the younger man. “Purdy. . . .” She caught herself before she added “boy” to his name.

Little Horse caught it and snickered under his breath.

She gave the older officer a fierce look. Investigator trainee, Jason Purdy, jumped up from the folding table and headed over.
He’s an eager one––a good sign in a new investigator.

“Get your things,” Cameron said to Purdy. “We’re going to pick up Mitch Taylor for questioning.”

The morning sun peeked over the mountains to the east while John Hunter made the ninety minute journey north to Los Angeles. The radio blasted out tunes, and yet, he couldn’t recall a single song. How was he going to deal with the obvious security breach?
It’s probably a prison offense.

I’ll dance around it if it comes to that––besides, they couldn’t prove I broke an unbreakable encryption. I won’t bring it up––they might try to use it as leverage to get me to do something I’d rather not do.
He had to get hold of his friend at Langley.

John strolled through the expansive concrete quadrangle of the Los Angeles Federal Building on Wilshire Boulevard. Once through the entry of aluminum and glass doors, he approached the X-ray machine and dropped his boat shoes and the contents of his pockets into the plastic bin.

The apprehensive armed guard studied him before he signaled John to pass through the metal detector. “What agency are you here for?”

“FBI.”

“Seventeenth floor.” The guard pointed to the bank of elevators.

John Hunter thought it odd that only a couple days before he had been in the Orange County Sheriff’s office, and now the FBI. It felt like he’d been pulled out of retirement, but he was still dressed for vacation. He wondered what the FBI would think when he showed up in his old jeans, faded green Spooner surfer shirt, and a ball cap with Wyland’s whale emblem. Would they take him seriously?

He exited the elevator and faced the double glass doors leading into the one office that occupied the seventeenth floor––bulletproof he guessed, with the emphasis on Homeland Security. Across its pane was the oval gold on blue emblem––Department of Justice––Federal Bureau of Investigation––exactly what he had imagined. It was impressive and a bit intimidating.

“May I help you?” the duty agent at the counter asked when John approached.

“I need to use your secured line. My name is John Hunter.”

“Are you associated with the Bureau?”

“Just a concerned citizen.”

“Are you a wise ass?” the agent shot back.

“No.”

“We don’t have a secured line. What exactly is your business with the Bureau?” her voice stern and commanding. She stared at his attire—raggedy jeans and hat.

“None––I don’t have
any
business with the FBI. I just need to use your phone.”

“We don’t have one.” Her hand rested on the butt of her holstered weapon. “How about you show me some ID.”

John pulled out his wallet and handed over his driver’s license.

“Okay,” she said. “I can see that you’re legal to drive in the state of California.”

“May I speak with a supervisor? Tell them I used to have SCI clearance.”

She pulled her radio mike close and keyed it, “I have a John Hunter out here. He said to tell you he has SCI clearance.”

“Had,” John interrupted.

The woman stared at him like she didn’t particularly like being interrupted. “He
had
SCI and claims he needs a secure line. I told him we don’t have one.”

“I’ll be right out,” the voice came back over the radio.

A few minutes later, the door at the back of the office swung open. A man with a shaved head, in his fifties, wearing a cheap looking dark blue suit, marched toward John. “I’m Special Agent-in-Charge Jeffrey Roman. What is it you want Mister. . . ?” He glanced over at his agent behind the counter.

“Hunter, John Hunter,” she said while handing the driver’s license to Roman.

“I need a secure line to Langley.”

“Are you with the CIA?” Roman studied the disheveled attire from boat shoes to loose fitting shirt.

“No. I used to have TS/SCI clearance at the White House and Pentagon,” John said.

Roman crossed his arms, his body language suggested to John that he didn’t believe him.

“What was your position at the White House?” Roman asked.

“I wasn’t an employee. The only thing I can tell you is that the company I owned did computer security work.”

“I need to make some calls. We’ll see about your top security status. I’ll borrow this.” He held up the driver’s license. “It may take awhile.” The man pointed. “Mister Hunter, you may have a seat.” He gestured to the grey upholstered chairs in the lobby.

John felt uncomfortable sitting in the gloomy waiting room. He had the feeling that the pea green paint on the walls was from the lowest bid on some government contract in the 1960’s––probably left over Army paint from World War II. His mind drifted.
Somewhere, there must be warehouses full of five-gallon buckets of this color.
It made him nauseated. The floor added to his anxiety with its checkerboard pattern of black and white alternating squares of linoleum. The whole place felt old––really old. The door burst open and interrupted his thoughts on the frugality of government.

Roman appeared and waved him into the back office. “I thought you said that you used to have clearance.”

“I did, before I sold my company—you don’t show it?”

“It’s still active status,” Roman said. He unlocked the door leading to a small room. A telephone sat in the middle of an otherwise empty desk.

“It’s a soundproof room. Take your time, Mister Hunter. Let me know if you need anything.”

John dialed a series of numbers, followed by his old ID code, and an extension. The phone rang through to a direct line at the CIA in Langley, Virginia, to Assistant Director Theodore Emerson Bryce’s desk.

“John, how are you? You know you’re not supposed to use this line for personal calls.”

“Teddy, it’s not a personal call. Why is my security clearance still active?”

The line remained silent.

“Does that mean that the NSA, FBI, and you guys are still keeping track of me?”

“Are you calling about a job? If you want to come and work for me at Langley, I’ll create a position.”

“And leave the good life here in Newport Beach? No, I don’t think so. I’m calling about a potential problem.”

“I’m listening.”

“A close friend of mine was murdered––Dr. Laura Flynn Douglas. Someone may have come across some information that Laura worked as a behavioral analyst at the CIA.”

“Never heard of a Doctor Douglas. Are you sure she worked for us? What specific information did they find?”

“Psychological profiling.” John was being vague. “Teddy, I just want to know what kind of trouble we could be in by digging around in her past?”

“We?” Teddy let the word hang out there for a while. “Trouble?”

“Come on, Teddy. What kind of trouble are we in, here?”

“Why would you think you’re in trouble?”

There was a long pause while John now let Teddy ponder the question.

“John, I don’t know this Doctor Douglas.” He hesitated. “Why did you say
we
?” Before John could speak, it came to Teddy. “You broke an encrypted password, didn’t you?”

“I’m not saying.” John could feel Teddy shaking his head on the other end of the line. “Teddy, am I going to have to worry that late one night a couple of guys, whether they’re CIA or one of those profiled, are going to snatch me up from some street corner, blindfold me, and rough me up, or worse?”

Teddy started to laugh. “You watch too many movies, buddy.
You’ve
got security clearance. How could
you
be in trouble?”

“I’m worried about the sheriff’s homicide detective who’s working the case. She’s reviewed the information for leads in her investigation.” John would tell her in a couple of hours––but Teddy didn’t need to know. “She’s also a friend of mine, and I’m wondering if you could help her out at the Agency––just get her to the right people that Laura Douglas worked for—maybe they could shed some light on who killed her. It might work out for the Agency too if she figures out who ordered the murder. It looks like the doctor was murdered by a professional.”

“
If
this doctor worked for us,” Teddy emphasized. “What was her name, again?”

“Doctor Laura Flynn Douglas. Teddy, can you run a temporary security clearance on Sheriff Homicide Investigator Cameron West before she calls so that she can discuss Laura with the supervisor?”

“John, this is an unusual request. Why don’t you have the investigator call me on my private line today at one o’clock, your time.” He read off the number. “I’ll be in meetings until then.”

“Thanks, Teddy. We need to get together sometime.”

“Come by my office the next time you’re in D.C., and we can talk about that job offer.”

“You couldn’t pay me enough,” the billionaire said.

“John, where is this doctor’s computer––I hope it’s somewhere safe.”

“Never took it out of the sheriff’s evidence lockup––couldn’t be safer.” John wasn’t lying—all he had was a copy of the hard drive on his boat.